Marvel Pinball: Deadpool review

This afternoon I’ve mostly been playing the spanking new Marvel Pinball: Deadpool table, and I couldn’t resist having a quick blast on the old Star Wars tables while I was in there. Brilliant.

I should mention that I tested Marvel Pinball: Deadpool on the PS3, but barring an uncharacteristically shoddy port that flies in the face of everything Zen Pinball has released to date, you’re all but guaranteed a similarly enjoyable experience on your smartphone and/or tablet.

Ok, logistics first of all. The Deadpool table is available as an in-app purchase for Zen Pinball, which is free on both the App Store and Google Play; or Marvel Pinball, which is 69p on the App Store and 65p on Google Play. In either case, the Deadpool table costs £1.49 (or thereabouts; not sure about the Android pricing “TBH”).

I should note again that you can’t sync purchases on Zen Pinball with Marvel Pinball, and things get even more complicated when you throw in other platforms like the PS3 and PS Vita.

But anyway! Yes, what we have here is the same-old Zen Pinball thing (in a good way), so that’s multiple ramps, multiple views, multiple tasks specific to the protagonist, and indeed multi-balls, all of which amounts to, er, multiple o… No, I can’t say it.

In Marvell Pinball: Deadpool, Nolan North voices Wade Winston Wilson, the “Merc with the mouth”, and deftly treads the line between amusingly obnoxious and just plain annoying.

Breaking the fourth wall in typical Deadpool fashion, the antihero jokes that his table’s claim to “revolutionise gaming” is nothing more than hyperbole – but at least it’s better than Iron Man’s.

The soundtrack is suitably ridiculous, too, recalling the down-tuned nu-metal antics of Limp Bizkit, and the music changes often enough – if you happen to be doing a challenge, for example – to keep things interesting.

Marvel Pinball: Deadpool also proudly boasts that it’s the first table to reference chimichangas, while Blind AI mode (she being one of Deadpool’s sidekicks) kills the lights, leaving only the ball, flippers and target lanes illuminated. Pretty cool.

And that’s Marvel Pinball: Deadpool in a nustshell. Lots going on as you would expect, and really the only con here is that some people might find Deadpool annoying, but that’s kinda the whole point.

Pros

Nolan North’s voice work

The nu-metal soundtrack

Blind AI mode looks awesome

Cons

Potentially annoying (again, that’s the point)

Summary: Marvel Pinball: Deadpool marks yet another successful outing for Zen Studios, one that does an excellent job of moulding the insane-o Deadpool world into a pinball table.